I don’t normally follow gossip blogs, but when I saw a mention that Hayden Panettierre has red hair, I had to check it out. Being a natural red head, I’m always intrigued when others “go red”. I want to see what shade they go with and how they look with red hair vs. their previous look. I have to say I was completely shocked that Hayden went red. But hey, experimenting with hair color can be a curious and fun experience. Especially when you’re an actress and can be constantly changing your looks for different roles. [I have had my share of hair coloring curiosity - you can read my story below.]

Immediately upon seeing the pictures of Hayden’s red hair, I like her better with her golden locks. Not saying she looks ugly with red hair (because I don’t think she could look ugly), but her blonde shade seemed to suit her skin color better. Now granted, the photos taken of her at the airport are with her sans makeup. So, I might like her red hair with makeup that coordinates with her new hue. And sometimes these things grow on me as time goes on – so we’ll see if she keeps it red long enough for me to change my mind.

My hair coloring experience

In high school I let me grandma highlight my hair. Well, it didn’t turn out well, so I went dark (thought it was dark brown, but it ended up being so dark, it looked black). With my pale skin (remember, natural red head here), I was told it looked gothic [which apparently I can pull off as my husband remembers the first time he saw me was when I dressed up for gothic day for Homecoming my freshman year - the first time I saw him was on cowboy day when he wore chaps (I wore chaps that day too) but that's a whole different story].

Oh yea, so I went to the salon to get my hair fixed but apparently the lady was confused when adding the dye to my hair & only highlighted with my natural color which didn’t mix well with the dark coloring – it resulted in green highlights when I was in fluorescent lighting (which of course is what was in all the classrooms at school & earned me the nickname of Shrek from one of the boys in my class). So I went to my regular salon and begged the Queen of color correction (and my favorite stylist) to fix my hair. She said she’d fix it, but she made me wait over a month so that I would never want to ruin my beautiful hair ever again. She had to bleach all the color out a few times before being able to add the red – which was an exact match for my natural color. Of course, red fades fast & she took a job with Redken and moved, so I went back and got low-lights added until the red grew out enough to take over.

Now it’s been 7 years & I haven’t touched my hair with color. Sure I get the “your color is so beautiful” every time I get my hair cut & they say “have you ever thought of putting in some blonde highlights?” – I briefly explain that I had a hair catastrophe & have learned my lesson and won’t be coloring anytime soon.